It is often desirable for athletes or individuals undergoing training, physical therapy, or a weight loss regimen to include resistance in an exercise or therapy session. To this end, various devices and types of wearing apparel have been developed over the years that incorporate weight into their designs. By inclusion of weight into the garment itself, the wearer can enjoy the benefits of weight resistance without the inconvenience associated with ankle weights, dumbbells, sandbags and other such separate accessories.
One example of a garment of the foregoing type is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,144,694 (Daoud et al.), entitled “Exercise Apparel and Weight Packets”. The garment disclosed therein includes a vest, pants, spine strap, belt, wrist bands, ankle bands and weight packets. The weight packets include plural rows and plural columns of weight members that are installed in pockets, and the pockets are positioned to distribute the weights about the wearer's body. The placement of the weights is solely maintained by the snugness of the garment's fit to the wearer's body.
Another example of the foregoing type of garment is the exercise vest described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,937,441 (Raines). This weighted exercise and therapeutic vest, when worn by a person involved in either athletic training, physical therapy or a weight reduction program, enhances the benefits of the activity undertaken. The vest has a snug, form-fitting design that clings snugly to the wearer's body, and may be constructed with pockets or other receptacles into which weights may be inserted.
The vest described in Raines represents a notable improvement in the art over previously known exercise vests in that its unique construction provides sufficient support to the applied weights to fix their placement relative to the wearer. This is accomplished through (a) the use of material that resists stretch in one direction while facilitating stretch in another; (b) the inclusion of support straps as an integral component of the vest's construction that join one or more weight compartments in which the weight packets are contained (by continuously connecting the strap to the vest along the entire length of the strap, the load of the weight packet may be distributed across the body of the vest); and (c) the utilization of a rubberized coating applied to at least portions of different components that are positioned into face-to-face engagement during use (the friction experienced between the two rubberized surfaces resists slippage of the weighted portions with respect to the suit and the body of the person wearing it).